(20) Medic

The lights of the parlor drew to a low lit shade, basking the room in a warm glow, like candlelight. The romanticism was certainly pushed to its brink, she thought as she sat there at her small table. This place was not one she might have visited in the past, certainly--she found no reason for the "opportunities" the Gilded Rose supplied, though most other patrons gave no thought to the taboos they were breaking. She traced circles into her sketchbook, blocking out the curious sounds that rose from the darkest corners of the establishment. Annaliese was simply sitting in her chair as an artist.

And perhaps to detach herself further from current events.

Faith was a fragile thing. Anna's had been in a downward tumble too as she questioned Keruptis' ways silently. She had never been as intent as some of her Brothers and Sisters in their rituals. Perhaps the only sense that kept her within the Order was her calling to find the Lost, the Mistrusted, the individuals no one else could offer a place as she could. She knew she was only feeding the empty space in her heart that existed from the loss of her children, but it felt good to comfort, to answer the shunned with understanding.

Another flick of her wrist, and the pencil traveled down the paper sharply, her eyes falling upon a pair of lovers, uncaring of who watched them in their seduction of each other. Such passions she found interesting to relate through her own eye. Expression of bodies took on a whole new meaning in these acts, it was a test of her abilities, certainly. She sighed as her mind shot to Knath suddenly, and quickly shut out the vision of him. They had been together for such a long while, and yet…he provoked something in her she couldn't stand anymore. He had a way of fogging her sensibilities, intervals of time lost to her in his company. Indeed, there were literal days when she could hardly remember what she was doing, only that she had been with him, with the Other voice in her head mocking away at her manipulation.

Knath made her feel unsafe.

At least the Other was quiet, only strong enough to make itself known in her mind when she was near him. She closed her thoughts against the building presence, knowing only thinking of it she was calling upon it. Her eyes darted over a half-dressed couple, completely immersed in nothing but themselves. She found herself envying their distraction.

"Impressive artwork…" she heard someone speak behind her. The table shook as she jumped, losing grip of her own pencil, a breath on the back of her neck. Pale fingers grasped the pencil in a fluid motion before it could roll off the table.

"…huh?" Anna uttered very softly, and found herself gazed down by a pair of yellow eyes. Golden yellow. She turned back toward the table, her heart beating a little faster as the man moved closer still, looming over her shoulder to study her sketch. Was he Forsaken!?

"Yes I…thank you…I thought it would be interesting, another way of studying," she mumbled with a nervous smile, not really knowing what she was saying. Her track of thought seemed to end as he wrapped his cool hand over hers, tucking the pencil back into her hand.

"If I may…" he began, settling a white kit on the table next to her. A worker then? A Medic, from the look of the kit. She stared at his hand as he guided hers and the pencil upon the parchment, all the while lecturing into her ear. The breaths against her skin made her shiver, and not out of repulsion.

Annaliese was beginning to realize that it would be a very strange, yet interesting night. She would have her distraction after all.